


Fathers

by lillpon



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-06
Updated: 2019-09-06
Packaged: 2020-10-11 03:02:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20539058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lillpon/pseuds/lillpon
Summary: From an anonymous prompt: Both Hooks bump into each other at Regina’s crowning ceremony and bond over their daughters.





	Fathers

Killian smiled as he saw… _Killian_, or Rogers, stand next to a young blond woman, who reminded him of someone.

He and Emma walked up to them, and upon closer inspection… that woman looked like his- their mother. Not exactly, of course, her red locks only seemed to have survived through the colour of his stubble, but her eyes, her smile, her expressive face…

“Alice, I presume,” he said once they reached them. 

Alice looked at him in awe. “Wow. You weren’t kidding,” she said, turning towards his other self. Her father.

“I’m happy you’ve found each other again,” Emma said with a warm smile.

“Aye, so are we,” Rogers said and put his arm around Alice’s shoulder. She leaned into him and he kissed her hair. Killian assumed it’s not that regular, for grown-up people to be so open to touch from their parents - especially when they barely look old enough to be their parents - but given their circumstances, he understood. He looked down at the bundle in his arms, his own daughter, the one he’d move worlds for.

“Are you… Emma Swan? The Emma Swan that saved my papa?” Alice said, looking at her.

Emma smiled widely. “Yes. Though it was more like a… collective effort,” she said, gesturing among her, Killian and Rogers.

Alice smiled, a full-toothed, almost sad smile he knew all too well and put her arms around her. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

Meanwhile, Killian was looking at the scene without registering most of it. He turned towards his lookalike… Alice had called him _papa_. He then turned towards Hope. She was still too young to speak, but the thought of her calling him that, and calling Emma _mama_…

“How’s your little bundle of joy?” Rogers said, taking a step towards him.

Killian looked up at him, and turned his baby daughter a little towards him so that he could see her. “Oh, you know. The usual. Feedings, diapers, sleepless nights… and…”

“Fear,” Rogers said in a low voice.

“Aye,” Killian admitted. “You were alone, right?” He looked up with wide eyes. “How did you… get over it?”

Rogers sighed. “There were times it was so… hard. I feared I’d managed to fail her before I even knew she was coming to this world. Like it was… all my fault, that she was trapped there.” He looked up at him.

Killian rocked his daughter uneasily. “And then?”

“And then, she’d look at me, and I’d know that… whatever I felt, it didn’t matter. She needed me, and I was there for her. And, every time she learned something new, every time I saw her manage something on her own - read a book, draw, beat me at chess,” he snorted a laugh, “I felt I was failing her a little less. I felt I was getting better, a bit. She was happy, and I was happy.”

Killian contemplated his words. This Killian Jones had never met his brother in death, he’d never made peace with the fake pedestal he- they both had put him on. And he hadn’t- he… he hadn’t had any other family, trapped in the situation he and Alice both had been.

“I feel like a cheater,” Killian admitted. “I have Emma, her parents… a whole family there to help me whenever I’m facing problems. And you…”

Rogers simply shook his head. “Oh, problems come anyway. But this,” he said, pointing at Hope, “it’s your story.”

“What?” Killian said, perplexed.

Rogers laughed. “Too much time spent with Henry, I guess. But I know you too. We’ve been through the same things… at least for most of our lives. I know you already love your daughter, so much that you feel you’d move worlds for her. So trust in her. Trust in her to receive what you give her. What you _and Emma_ give her. It’ll be alright. And when she smiles at you, when she looks at you and you just _know_ she loves you back… part of that burden will lift, every time.”

Killian was speechless. For a moment, he spaced out, thinking what his other self had just said. He _was_ so much like him - his life merely changed by having Alice in his life. If Rogers could do it, if he could overcome his past pain and fear… then so could he.

He looked at him again and laughed out loud when he saw Rogers make silly faces at Hope. But he was making her laugh and her tiny giggles made his heart swell.

“She’s recognizing the faces, isn’t she? Not the first time she sees the likes of them?” Rogers said, looking at him with a grin.

Killian replied by raising his eyebrows. _Guilty._

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr, on May 19th 2018.


End file.
